New deli, cafe and bakery opens in Westbury Park

It has taken seven weeks to transform a disused shop in Westbury Park selling orthopaedic footwear into a bakery, cafe, deli, wine shop and homeware store that will also hopefully be able to become a wine bar in early 2021.

Little Shop & Pantry on Northumbria Drive has been opened by husband and wife team, Freddy and Nessa Bird, who are also the owners of nearby Little French.

The shop has been born out of lockdown during which the North View restaurant began selling a selection of wine, meats and dishes sourced, hand picked and pre-cooked by the Little French team.

Heading up the kitchen at Little Shop is Mark Holland, who previously worked with Freddy when the pair were both at the Lido in Clifton.

In the kitchen on Friday afternoon (the first day of opening), Freddy was preparing pesto for sandwiches the next day, while Mark was stocking the store cupboard.

Freddy Bird grew up in Bristol and the countryside surrounding the city – photo: Martin Booth

“We have lived in this neighbourhood for 11 years,” Nessa told Bristol24/7. “We know what we would like to see happening here.”

She added: “During the first lockdown in the restaurant we really turned it into a shop and we were that place where people could shop like a chef, as Freddy would put it… They said, ‘please don’t stop doing this’ and we listened.”

Come springtime, there will be decking outside Little Shop where customers will hopefully be able to sit, with tables inside once Bristol leaves tier three.

Freddy and Nessa both have vast experience in hospitality, but Nessa admits that retail “is a different beast” with the shop currently stocking only about half of what will eventually be on the shelves, fridges and even a Himalayan salt chamber.

Nessa Bird says that the homeware for sale in Little Shop are only products that she would buy herself – photo: Martin Booth

Freddy and Nessa, who opened Buxton & Bird pie shop in Wapping Wharf in August, envisage the different elements of Little Shop “all working together to create a space for curated food buying”.

Every day the team will be making fresh breads and pastries, cakes and savoury tarts, as well as a daily array or fresh salads and sandwiches.

They will be churning fresh ice cream, and have a click and collect food box scheme, including fruit and veg boxes, meat boxes, and fish boxes, with Extract coffee available to drink in or takeaway, and Middle Eastern salads and fresh seasonal quiches served seven days a week.

Nessa Bird behind the counter at Little Shop & Pantry – photo: Martin Booth

Freddy said that the area encompassing Westbury Park, Henleaze and Redland – in which Little Shop almost sits directly in the middle of – is where he and Nessa “want to be”.

“Little French has always been about good, affordable food for the neighbourhood. I wanted a neighbourhood restaurant and we are that as well as being a bit of a destination.

“And here, I want somewhere where people can buy chef-quality produce at sensible money. We don’t claim to be the cheapest but I want us to be the best value we can possibly be, so it’s good value for money, it’s good Pyrenean lamb, it’s good beef, it’s good suckling pig, making our own ice cream, making our own bread.

“I want people to use it as a neighbourhood place, not a swanky deli. Of course there are some expensive things, but it’s for people to get bread that is sensibly priced, coffee that is sensibly priced. It’s proper, real, artisan produce.”

66 Northumbria Drive used to be Bolton Bros, a company that was founded in Newcastle in 1893 – photo: Martin Booth

Main photo: Martin Booth

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